Google Issues More Than Just a Bug?

Being the biggest fish in the aquarium has its ups and downs. If you are having a "bad scale day," all the viewers will notice it pretty easily. So when Google's search results change dramatically, especially when focused towards a particular niche, someone will be sure to write about it. For example, the recent blog post at PBS (yes that PBS) blog MediaShift discusses that

just after Christmas... a Google bug made a handful of influential sex blogs “disappear” from Google search results.

The article links to a good post by Danny Sullivan, circa 2003 and titled Google Dance Case Studies. It also has an excellent interview with him on the current "blip," which Danny theorizes:

In this case, it seems like Google might have been tweaking porn filters somewhat

.

So the forum connection to this topic is thanks to WebmasterWorld, where a thread was started to discuss the PBS article. This thread has become much more than a discussion on algorithm tweaks and blips, as WMW administrator Tedster introduces his theory that there is a lot more than just a few minor things going on at Google at the same time to just be coincidence. He cites over a half dozen threads at WMW discussing issues with Google, including: